Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Breathe New Life Into Your Old iPad With These Tips

by Yaara Lancet
Own an iPad 2? Or maybe even a first generation iPad? Your device is barely 3-4 years old, and yet at times it feels like complete junk. I know all about it, I own one too.
This is not an accident. The companies who make these devices want them to be short lived. What better way to make money than have us buy a new iPad even year or two? But unless your iPad is really broken or totally shot, you don’t have to get a new one. If you feel that your iPad is not what it used to be, a few simple actions may restore some of its original zest.
The tips below are not a guarantee. They will not turn your old iPad into a new device. For some iPads, they may not have any effect at all. But if you manage to breathe some life into your trusty old iPad and carry on for a while longer, you’ve not only saved some money, you’ve kept yourself out of the endless consumer loop for just a bit longer.

Upgrading (Or Not Upgrading) iOS

upgrade-ios
There are many opinions on this matter. Some say you should keep to the latest version of iOS at all times, others say you should not upgrade old devices. No answer is right all of the time — there are too many variables to take into account, and each iPad is different. There’s one thing I know for sure, though: my first generation iPad has never been the same since upgrading to iOS 5. I wish I had never upgraded.
While new versions of iOS add polish and useful features, they’re not really meant for old devices. The first iPad can’t go beyond iOS 5, and was better off with iOS 4. The iPad 2 just might be better off with iOS 5, or if you’ve already upgraded, with iOS 6. If you own an older iPad, upgrading to iOS 7 might not be the best thing for your device. Yes, you’ll have to give up some nice new features, but it’s worth it to keep your iPad in a better working condition.
Apple’s official line is that you should always update, and this is much of the time down to software. Developers will always write with the latest version of iOS in mind, and while many retain backwards compatibility with iOS 5 and 6, priority is given to newer revisions.
This goes for iPhones as well, by the way. Own an iPhone 4? iOS 7 may not be the best choice for you.

Freeing Up Room: Delete Unused Apps & Photos

If your iPad is full to the brim with apps and photos, or even if you just have a bunch of apps you never use, it may be time for some spring cleaning. While an extra app or two is not going to make much of a difference, many of us have loads of apps lying around which we just never use.
A good way to start is by going to Settings > General > Usage, and checking how much free space you have on your iPad. Here you can also see which apps take up the most amount of space on your iPad — these may be ones you don’t actually use. You can delete large apps from this screen by tapping the app, or if you want to delete other apps, just uninstall them the good old way by tapp.
delete-apps
If your device is really full, getting rid of a boatload of photos may help too. If you keep those on your device, you should have them backed up elsewhere anyway. If you don’t, transfer your photos to your PC or Mac via iCloud or using the Dropbox app, and delete them from your device.
If you get rid of many apps this way, there should be a noticeable difference in your iPad’s performance.

Give PhoneClean A Try

There are things on your iPad you can’t delete manually. Others, such as you browser’s cache, are just a hassle to get to all the time.PhoneClean is one of those apps that promises to clean up your iDevice, and surprisingly enough, it actually works!
I’ve given PhoneClean 2 a thorough testing on my old iPad, and managed to free up more than 1GB without deleting a single app. This is a great way to ensure your iPad is not getting slowed down by unnecessary junk, and is also a good way to free up some space without having to give up any of your precious apps.
phoneclean
The amount of space you can free with PhoneClean will vary from device to device, naturally, but getting rid of junk is always useful. This trick will work on old iPhones too, and can even benefit your newer iDevices.

Disable Spotlight Search

How many times a day do you use Spotlight Search? How many times have you used Spotlight Search since you’ve owned your iPad? If you’re anything like me, you can count the number on two hands or less. Spotlight Search is a great feature, but most of the time, it just isn’t necessary. If you keep your apps in relatively good order, and don’t have hundreds of them, there’s a good chance you rarely use Spotlight Search. So now what?
In order for Spotlight Search to work, it has to keep indexing all the content on your device. This includes your apps, emails, notes, music, messages, reminders, and pretty much everything else. If you rarely use the feature anyway, why not save some resources and stop this indexing?
spotlight
To do this, go to Settings > General > Spotlight Search, and uncheck all the items on the list. If you actually use Spotlight Search for certain things, such as finding buried apps, you can leave the indexing on just for those items, and uncheck all the rest. This will still save some resources, and could benefit your iPad.

Give Your Home Button Another Chance

We now come to one of the most controversial tips in iOS history: the old Home button fix. Many old iPads (and iPhones) suffer from a shady Home button. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, and your entire iPad experience is just not the same. Is there a fix?
home-button
There might be. While many call this trick “recalibrating the Home button”, that’s not what this is about. I’ve never found a definite answer as to why this trick works, but the bottom line is that it does manage to fix many problematic Home buttons.
In a nutshell, you need to launch a pre-installed iOS app, press and hold the power button until the shut down prompt appears, and then press and hold your Home button until the app force closes. It sometimes takes several cycles of this to get results, but it does get results for many. Is it the pressing and holding of the Home button the does the trick? Is it something else? I don’t really know. All I know is that it’s harmless and worth a try.
Get detailed instructions and more info about this method in the full Home button fix post, along with another trick you can try if this doesn’t work. The comments to this post are also filled with useful tips, such as cleaning out the Home button with alcohol and a Q-tip.

Repurpose It

car-ipad
If nothing works, and you can’t get your iPad to behave well enough for your regular needs, don’t throw it away. Aside from giving it away to a child or a friend, there are many things you can do with it.
If you have lots of photos, you can turn your iPad into a dedicated media album, or even a business portfolio. You can mount it in your car, use it as a recipe book, or even as a remote control.
Another way to go is to trade your old iPad for money, or simply sell it on Craiglist, and use that to buy a new iPad. If you own a really old iPad, you may not get a lot of money for it, though, but you can make sure you sell it to someone who will use it or its parts, and not just throw it away.

What Works For You?

Do you own an old iPad or iPhone? What have you managed to do to keep it in good working order? Is it worth the effort, or do you just go for a newer model when the older one starts to go off? Share your experiences in the comments.

Source: www.makeuseof.com

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